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Eddy Vluggen wrote: All struggle for survival, and where they need not, they multiply until they become a burden to the local ecosystem, even to the point of endangering it (and their own survival). The thing that sets us apart from the rabbits in Australia is that we can actually think about the problem and the limits of the ecosystem.
Yes, but looking at the news... we still act like if we couldn't
M.D.V. 
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Looking at the news; the US can't say openly they are competing with China, Russia or Iran, but behind the curtains there has been an economic war going for years.
The thing that mystifies me is how US students think they will improve the world by inventing 60+ genders. I blame the idea that you can be "anything you want".
You can't.
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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I said nothing about US...
I was meaning about the equilibrium with the ecosystem and its actual lack of it considering the human race.
M.D.V.
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
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TL;DR BE KIND TO ANIMALS!
Eddy Vluggen wrote: If you in a bad mood
I'm not 
Eddy Vluggen wrote: To illustrate my point, how is your weight doing?
Not so good, gained another kg 
I don't know how that illustrates your point though.
Vegetarians can be as unhealthy and overweight as meat eaters 
Eddy Vluggen wrote: it will simply ignore lettuce
Because she doesn't know any better, I do.
I don't need meat and it's not so good that I'd be willing to cruelly sacrifice animals for it.
It's the production process I'm opposed to, not so much the eating.
Eddy Vluggen wrote: That has never been extended to animals; that's why one is called murder, and the other is simply slaughter (and taxed).
It has been extended to animals, animal cruelty is forbidden.
Anyway, "entitlement" is a cultural construct, so by natural laws you're no more entitled than the mouse you killed.
Except you're big and strong and the mouse isn't.
You could've used that big and strong body and those smart brains to find a way to get the mouse back in the field where it belongs, but unfortunately for the mouse you decided to kill it instead.
If everyone did what you do, we'd be out of animals real soon (and die because a lot of animals, mostly insects, are necessary for life to flourish).
Eddy Vluggen wrote: We can and did. We even standardized its testing, and some animals do the same tests (and succeed).
No we can't and no we didn't.
We invented some test that tests some things we find important.
Math and language, typical stuff that computers can ace, but you wouldn't call a computer intelligent.
A jungle tribe wouldn't even know what the test was, but they survive in the jungle, something we are to "stupid" for.
In earlier times such tests would've looked very different as well.
So even if that test measures any form of intelligence is very much place and time bound.
"Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid." - Unknown (not Einstein as is often believed)
Eddy Vluggen wrote: An undamaged rooster is a dangerous animal.
Yes it is, that's why I said chickens.
Eddy Vluggen wrote: Point is that laws and moral have no place in nature, and animals have no God-given rights.
And we're nothing but mammals, so basically we have the same rights as that mouse.
Eddy Vluggen wrote: see the rabbit in Australia.
Which people brought over.
Lots of pests we have are self-inflicted either by introducing a non-native species, by destroying natural habitats or by killing a natural enemy 
And here you are saying these poor bunnies that didn't even want to be there are an evil pest 
Eddy Vluggen wrote: The line you draw is a cultural one and ours is just one of many
That's just my point, mine is NOT cultural.
I just try to respect other animals as I would like to be respected.
It's not always easy or possible, I too have some basic survival instinct, that's why I'm now killing the ants in my house, but I wouldn't kill a single mouse just for being there.
And to be fair, if hundreds of people came into my house and started stealing me food, like the ants try, I'd start killing them too
Eddy Vluggen wrote: What man doesn't want to hear is that all animals are equal
So why did you kill the mouse and not your neighbor?
You say it, but try to act like it a bit more
For clarity, by letting that mouse live, not by killing your neighbor
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Sander Rossel wrote: Not so good, gained another kg
I don't know how that illustrates your point though.
Vegetarians can be as unhealthy and overweight as meat eaters
I tought you were underweight?
Sander Rossel wrote: It's the production process I'm opposed to, not so much the eating.
I'd have to agree there.
Sander Rossel wrote: Math and language, typical stuff that computers can ace, but you wouldn't call a computer intelligent.
It tests more than math and language, and it only applies to living creatures. There's also no computer yet that will succeed at the test, since it is more than just a measurement of vocabulary and math. Try writing an application that does the part of the test called "ruimtelijk inzicht", where the computer has to choose from four pictures, pointing out the one that can be folded into the result.
Sander Rossel wrote: A jungle tribe wouldn't even know what the test was, but they survive in the jungle, something we are to "stupid" for.
That's not intelligence, but knowledge, and no, that knowledge is not lost in North Europe.
Sander Rossel wrote: So why did you kill the mouse and not your neighbor?
Because of the social contract that our society has, and because the cat hunts mice, not neighbours.
Bastard Programmer from Hell
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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Sander Rossel wrote: Oh by the way, they eat cats and dogs because cats and dogs aren't entitled to anything.
And in spain we eat rabbits and mussels, and in france frogs and snails... so what?
Only because cats and dogs are home pets here, doesn't mean they can't be eaten.
Pork is forbidden in muslims countries and cow/beef is forbidden in india...
All that are cultural laws, not natural laws. In the nature everything is potential food for any other life form, soon or later.
Sander Rossel wrote: Cruelty towards cats and dogs is forbidden in the Netherlands because they're slightly more entitled over here.
Eat them doesn't necessarily mean cruelty. Cruelty for the sick of it should be forbidden everywhere and with everything.
Sander Rossel wrote: Fun experiment, they once personalized a cow, gave it a name and everything.
It was on TV and people loved it.
Then it had to be slaughtered because it was meant for consumption.
People protested against the slaughter of that particular cow, but no doubt ate another cow that same evening.
What does that tell you about people?
That they usually have full stomach. If they were enough hungry and then that cow was put in the same room... the experiment would have ended in a different way.
M.D.V.
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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Nelek wrote: And in spain we eat rabbits and mussels, and in france frogs and snails... so what?
I make a mean sweet/sour rabbit, but you can keep the snails.
Nelek wrote: All that are cultural laws, not natural laws. In the nature everything is potential food for any other life form, soon or later.
We fall back to that every time there is the need for it. A war, depression, pandemic, and suddenly we eat roadkill.
Nelek wrote: Eat them doesn't necessarily mean cruelty. Cruelty for the sick of it should be forbidden everywhere and with everything.
Agreed! And meat grown for us should be living well - we have too much news where some stable burned down with thousands of animals in it.
Bastard Programmer from Hell
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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Nelek wrote:
All that are cultural laws, not natural laws. In the nature everything is potential food for any other life form, soon or later.
For any regulation by society, whether regulating the food you eat, the parts of your body you display, who you can have which kind of sex with, or whatever: If I find one culture that has accepted some action fully, I dare question whether it is a "law of nature" that it should be forbidden. If two cultures, independent of each other, both has come to the conclusion that it is OK, then I more that "question" it. If three cultures all have the same idea, that it is acceptable, and you can with reasonable certainty decide that they have come to this by themselves, not enforced by one culture on the other, then I am certain that there is nothing "against nature" in accepting it. It is a pure cultural convention.
If you like to read anthropological reports (especially those made before the Western world enforced its moral upon the entire world), you will realize that 99,9% of the "against nature" moral laws do not qualify. They are pure cultural artifacts.
So, should we ignore them? I think we should treat them with "mild opposition". Society expects you to wear clothes in public, so you do. But you certainly do not promote it fiercely in discussions. Like the Yanomani people in Brazil (/Venezuela): When they go to work in the white society, they wear western clothes, but when they meet the authorities on behalf of their people, they go as their own culture expects: naked. I honor them for that, and defend them, if the topic comes up in discussions. At home, kids can run around naked (most kids prefer that in summer), you teach them that when they go out in public, they must dress up - only because they are expected to, not for any other reason.
Some rules make sense. Like if you are living in a hot country with no cooling facilities - like the Jews in old testament days, or the Moslems in the the same area, pork might easily be infected by Thrichinella, which is not very healthy. So the rule against eating pork made a lot of sense in those cultures in the old days. Today, with freezers and fridges and close control over the entire production chain, it does not make sense any more. Understanding why that religious / cultural law was there makes it much easier to accept it as a historical fact - and provides arguments why it is silly in today's society.
I am not afraid of telling both adults and kids that "because everybody around is expecting it from us, we should do so-and-so, even if there is no real reason for it". Some against-morals things is perfectly OK, even if "society" doesn't condone it, as long as you keep it for yourself so that you do not offend anybody. (I guess I am willing to take that a lot further than many other people.)
Every now and then it is appropriate to offend/challenge other people. Then you should be very aware that you are doing that. Do it in a controlled, conscious manner. I do that regularly (including in my CP posts). But a "society" is a group of people agreeing on a common way of doing things. As long as following the same rules is essential for the society to work, follow them! Say, left or right side driving: No law of nature says one is wrong, the other right. But when a society has decided, live by it! You may argue against it, yet: live by those rules required for the society to run smoothly.
Of course there is a broad, fuzzy borderline. How much you want do challenge that borderline depends on how much you want to be a rebel. I see very few cases where rebels really oppose "nature". What they oppose is culture. Maybe it is just. Maybe some cultural regulations are good, after all - like deciding on which side of the road to drive. Yet I agree that a lot of cultural laws should be relaxed. Even if they are not "laws" in the legal but only in the moral sense, I think it would be appropriate to challenge them.
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Cute animals should not be eaten 
Nelek wrote: Pork is forbidden in muslims countries and cow/beef is forbidden in india...
In Middle East countries, they discovered several thousand years ago that trichinella was a much larger problem with pork than e.g. with mutton. So forbidding pork was a health measure - not that different from the "social distancing" we practice today.
In Arab countries, slaughtering camels for eating was similar to slaughtering cattle for eating in India. This has both a practical and a symbolic value: The oxen were essential for plowing the fields, to make sure that you will be wealthy next year as well. Camels were used for plowing as well, but also for transporting trade goods and many other functions. Slaughtering an ox or a camel would be like slaughtering the hen than laid the golden egg - it was so senseless that it was manifest as a religious commandment.
Once we understand why the moral/religious law was there in the first place, can we ask: But is it still relevant for us, today? Under all conditions? Sometimes it is, like agreeing on which side of the road to drive. Sometimes we are reluctant to admit that it is not, e.g. if birth control aids prevent genetically unhealthy situations. Sometimes it is obvious that it is not, e.g. intimate activities between people possessing the same basic anatomy.
There is no question: An open discussion of which legal/moral regulations are "nature" defined, which are defined to make the society run smoothly, and which are purely "we simply have decided this as a rule to distinguish between those of us who are 'in' and those who are 'out'" ... No such open discussion is at all possible in the Western society today. You are absolutely bound to, restricted by, a large number of Western rules that cannot seriously be challenged. If yo do, you are immediately an outcast that will not be listened to in the discussions.
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Nelek wrote: And in spain we eat rabbits and mussels, and in france frogs and snails... so what?
My point was that different animals are differently "entitled" is different parts of the world.
So entitlement is just a cultural construct and by that logic, culture aside, people aren't more entitled than any other animal.
I think that's what you said too, except you interpret it as a reason to eat other animal while I do the opposite
Nelek wrote: Eat them doesn't necessarily mean cruelty.
The eating doesn't, the production process does.
It's not just the way to the slaughter either, for many animals it's one cruel trip from the moment they're born.
I'm not so much opposed to the eating of animals as I am to the cruelty that precedes it, that's why I became a vegetarian 22 years ago.
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I will never try to hide that I am a fan of the short stories of Roald Dahl.
"Pig" (the short story, not the poem) is appropriate reading for this discussion.
I found a PDF version of it at the Internet: The Pig - Roald Dahl[^]
Another Roald Dahl story, also relevant here, is The Sound Machine - Roald Dahl[^].
Not perfect in formatting, but it was the first on-line copy I came across.
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Member 7989122 wrote: "Pig" (the short story
We have a very different definition of the word "short"
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To take the "serious" approach: Yes, you are probably right. "Pig" fulfills several of the formal requirements to a novel, e.g. it spans over a significant period of time (and this is significant to the story told), and the main characters are affected by events that changes them in some significant way.
I High School, we studied a story (Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson: Faderen[^] for those who read Norwegian) that fits in single web page (or four pages in print), yet it fulfills all major "novel" requirements.
Both "Pig" and "Faderen" are presented as short stories, though: My hardcopy of "Pig" is from "Roald Dahl - Collected Short Stories". These labels can't really be interpreted literally. A "novel" may be quite old, even though "novel" literally means "new". In Norwegian, a longer "novelle" (linguistically, a diminutive of novel, a small novel) may be presended as a "langnovelle", literally a "long short novel" - one that has the . A non-short novel we call a "roman" (rather than novel), even when the story has not trace of romantic feelings.
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Aka “the virus that I will not name”
If anyone else is like me and interested in the progress on vaccines, this seems to be a decent (and understandable) post on the current efforts: A Close Look at the Frontrunning Coronavirus Vaccines As of April 23 | In the Pipeline[^]
The author works in the pharmaceutical industry (and the posts he has on “Things I won’t work with” are a delight while you’re there), so it’s not some random wahoo dripping opinions.
TTFN - Kent
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FOOF, everyone needs a little FOOF[^]
"...JavaScript could teach Dyson how to suck." -- Nagy Vilmos
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The whole series are absolute treasures, but that one I never get tired of. 
TTFN - Kent
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Once again: proof to the fact that stupidity is far beyond infinity. 
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I'm going to be super-generous and assume he was merely expressing the truism that any form of cure we insert into the body (by IV or some cavity) to cure an infection is by definition the injection of a disinfectant ...
So maybe it's the colloquial use of the word "disinfectant" that's the issue here rather than the intellect of the leader of the free world.
Ooh, hang on though ...
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OriginalGriff wrote: The Donald says we don't need one - just bleach will do it:
Fake News. Come on, I would expect more from you.  
Social Media - A platform that makes it easier for the crazies to find each other.
Everyone is born right handed. Only the strongest overcome it.
Fight for left-handed rights and hand equality.
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The guy is a journalist. Meanwhile Oxford University started trials yesterday.
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Quote: got his BA from Hendrix College and his PhD in organic chemistry from Duke before spending time in Germany on a Humboldt Fellowship on his post-doc. He’s worked for several major pharmaceutical companies since 1989 on drug discovery projects against schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, osteoporosis and other diseases.
If he is "just" a journalist, he seems to have more knowledge about what he writes than many journalists
I give you that the magazine takes distance from what he writes saying it is a blog giving his own opinion and that he doesn't represent them in that column.
So I suppose sometimes is either not totally correct or not politically correct.
But I find this particular entry, pretty good written and giving information in a relative neutral and competent way (missing in many other places).
M.D.V. 
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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Quote: Derek Lowe, an Arkansan by birth, got his BA from Hendrix College and his PhD in organic chemistry from Duke before spending time in Germany on a Humboldt Fellowship on his post-doc. He’s worked for several major pharmaceutical companies since 1989 on drug discovery projects against schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, osteoporosis and other diseases.
And what surprise-the Oxford group is documented in the post you didn’t read.
TTFN - Kent
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